


The Bathroom Floor

by orphan_account



Category: Amazingphil - Fandom, Danisnotonfire - Fandom, Phandom, Youtubers
Genre: Angst, Anxiety, M/M, radio show
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-14
Updated: 2013-01-14
Packaged: 2017-11-25 13:33:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,939
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/639391
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Wow that title looks really suggestive</p>
<p>Everyone was writing fics about the radio show and i had an idea and then it ran away from me oops...</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Bathroom Floor

Dan burst into the bathroom, grateful no one else was in there and shut the door behind him. He stormed across the small room, pacing back and forth and feeling his breathing speed up faster and faster. Panic struck him as he caught a glimpse of the clock. He didn't have time for this! He and Phil were live in thirty minutes! The radio show! The radio show…  
***  
The last time this happened was a year and a half ago. Dan still remembered the feeling of a bucket of ice being poured into his stomach, their sharp edges slicing open his insides and their cold burn dragging down his throat. He remembered the feeling of glass in his lungs as his breathing sped up and his heart pounded against his ribs.  
Though most of this _was_ in his head, there was also a physical reaction to his attacks. His heart rate sped up immensely and his breathing ran away from him. It became harder and harder for his lungs to retain oxygen long enough for any of it to stay in his blood stream. His head would pound more and more and his mom said that when he was a kid he felt like he had an extremely high fever. As long as he calmed down soon enough, Dan would be okay. But sometimes it wasn't that simple.   
The clock in his manchester flat stared at him as the sun mocked him through the windows. It was getting late and his exam was tomorrow. He wasn't going to be able to do this.   
He was going to fail. He was going to flunk out of college and he wasn't going to be able to get a proper job and everything was going wrong. He was going to lose everything. Phil would kick him out, he was such a failure. He was a failure.  
Dan had sat in his room for three minutes, focusing _hard_ on his breathing. Since he was a kid he had always known this was the most important thing. Whenever these attacks came, breathing was the hardest to calm down. But once he had managed that, everything else followed suit.  
Dan had stayed in his room most of the night anyway and Phil hadn't bothered him, but he still worried he would walk in on him like this. Phil didn't know about the attacks and he wasn't going to any time soon.Dan let out a small whimper. Phil would think he was a freak. He'd be scared. No, Dan couldn't scare him.  
It felt like forever, it always felt like forever. But finally after two long minutes of counted breaths and streaming tears, Dan felt his heart slow to a normal pace and his body stop shaking. He let out a long sigh and stood up. His body felt weak as he stumbled into the bathroom to wash the sweat out of his hair.   
The doctor said it was kind of like a seizure, but there wasn't any medical thing that could be done about it. Whenever it happened someone just had to calm him down. But Dan was determined not to force this on Phil, he decided it the minute he moved in with him. He worked on it, even calling his mom a few times, but he finally made it so he could calm himself down when this happened. He focused on not getting so worried about things too, that helped.  
It had been a whole year…  
***  
Now, sat in a sweaty mess by himself on the bathroom floor of the BBC radio 1 studio, Dan could tell this one was different. His body wasn't even responding anymore. His breathing only climbed faster and faster and his heart felt like it was going to pop at any second, but it just kept pounding faster. The shaking was more violent too. His body jerked around on the floor, slamming against the wall. Dan gasped and whimpered, tears flowing from his eyes. He felt like he was going to die.  
Scared thoughts ran through his head like a marathon. _You're going to mess up. You're going to swear and get fired and someone will sue you for swearing while the radio was playing in front of their kid. You're going to get arrested. You're going to embarrass yourself in front of all of your viewers and your career as a youtuber is going to be over. Phil is going to hate you. He's worked so hard at this and he's so good at it. You're going to ruin it for him. You ruin everything._  
***  
Phil didn't notice Dan had left until about thirty minutes before they were going to go live. There wasn't anything to do until it was actually their turn in the studio so the boys had just been sitting in the lounge right outside, waiting for their turn. Phil had taken out his phone to check twitter one last time when Dan got up and ran to the bathroom. Phil shrugged, _probably just needed to pee_. he thought. After scrolling through his mentions and smiling at all of the happy and warm "good luck"s his fans sent him, he looked up. It had been five minutes, where was Dan?  
He walked over to the studio bathroom and knocked on the door. There was a rustling sound, something sounded like it was rolling around on the floor.  
"Dan? Dan are you in there?" No response.  
Phil put his hand on the handle. "Hello? Dan are you alright?" The rustling sound continued. Phil's heart raced.  
"Dan." he said firmly this time, turning the handle and cracking it open. If anyone besides Dan had been in there, they would have shouted by now. Phil slowly opened the door, inch by inch. He peered around the door carefully, looking around.   
His first thought was no one was on the toilet. His second thought was 'where is Dan?'. His third thought was _shit._  
He knew in a second what that ball of shivering black was on the floor.   
***  
Phil's mind flashed back to a year ago when he had walked in on his friend, carrying a nice warm cup of coffee, an encouraging smile on his face, when he was stopped dead in his tracks by a scary sight. Dan had been writhing on the floor, tears streaked all over his face and his eyes glossed over. Phil had panicked. He backed out of the room quickly, at the time, and ran straight to his own bedroom, shutting the door behind him. He had frantically pulled up his computer, googling everything and anything that could be wrong with Dan. He wanted to go in and ask him what was wrong. He could be dying! But Phil was scared. He was so scared.  
After a long and painful search he figured out it was an anxiety attack. He still remembered the sigh of relief he felt when it wasn't a seizure. Phil's brain had been picking at him the whole time. _If you don't go in there, he'll die. If it's a seizure, he'll die._  
Phil slowly walked out of his room and into the kitchen, opening the medicine cabinet and digging around through the back corners. Sure enough, he found a bottle with Dan's name on it with the word **ANXIETY** in all caps and bold. His hand held over the bottle for a moment before he pulled it away. Suddenly the door to Dan's room creaked open. Phil quickly shoved the medicine into the cabinet and shut it. His hands still shaking, he picked up the cup of coffee he had made for Dan and chugged it down to hide his red cheeks.  
"Hey," Dan mumbled. He walked over to the medicine cabinet and fumbled around in it. Phil couldn't see what he grabbed, but he heard the sound of pills pouring out into his friend's hands. Phil's eyes widened as the scalding coffee burned his throat. Dan shut the cubboard and turned to Phil.   
"Can i have a drink of that?" He gestured to the coffee. Phil nodded, still too stunned to say anything, and handed over the drink. He watched as Dan gulped down the pills and shuddered at the warm coffee spilling down his throat. He put the cup back down on the counter and sighed.   
Phil croaked, "A- Are you alright?" He managed to squeak.  
Dan looked up, his eyes calm and collected. Phil stared, "Yeah! I just have a head ache, so i took some pain killers." _He doesn't know i know,_ Phil thought. He just nodded as Dan left the kitchen. He doesn't know i know.  
Phil stormed back into his room. He was angry, not at Dan for not telling him about the anxiety attacks, but at himself for being his best friend and not knowing. They lived together! Phil kicked his chair lightly before slumping into it and opening up his laptop again. He wanted to research everything there was to know about these attacks so he could be there for Dan the next time this happened. He wanted to help Dan. He wan't to help.  
***  
Dan looked up nervously, Phil was standing over him. His already pounding heart did an extra leap and he gasped another hoarse breath. Phil had found him. He studied his best friend's face, trying to find any hint that he was scared or even disgusted. But Phil just looked calm. He slowly walked towards Dan's jerky figure and knelt down in front of him.  
"Dan? Dan, love, I'm here." His voice was so calming and so surreal, Dan's mind seemed to glaze over.   
Phil cupped his hand over his shaking friend's cheek. His face felt warm and he was covered in sweat. This was bad. The shaking itself was scary enough, if anyone walked in on this they would think he was having a seizure. Suddenly Phil thanked god that he had locked the door as soon as he walked in. The last thing that would help right now is if someone else walked in and called for help. Dan couldn't be crowded right now.   
Phil's instincts kicked in. This is what he had spent all those hours researching for that one, scary August day. This time he was ready. He knew what to do.  
Not letting his hand drop from his friend's face, Phil reached into his pocket and pulled out his wallet. In the coin pocket there was a tiny capsule and inside the compartment were two pills. Dan's anxiety pills. Phil always carried them around with him, just to be safe. He held them up in front of Dan's eyes but they didn't focus on them. Phil sighed and slowly pushed them into his mouth. He rubbed his thumb over his best friend's cheek while pouring water into his mouth. He was careful not to pour too much in case he choked. To his relief though, the brown-haired, glossy-eyed boy's neck flexed and he swallowed. Alright, now he just had to calm him down.  
You were supposed to hold their head in your lap and wrap them in a blanket, but Phil didn't have a blanket nor was Dan holding still enough to lay down on the ground without hurting himself. Phil instead leaned down so he was eye level with Dan again and spoke softly.  
"Dan? Dan can you hear me?" He forced his voice to stay calm. Dan needed him now, this was not the time to lose it. Dan's eyes still looked focused on something far away, and he didn't respond. Phil sighed and placed his free hand on Dan's side. He pulled the shaking body sideways so that he was sat in Phil's lap and Phil had his arms around him. Phil pushed his head against his chest and tightened his grasp. He could now feel the full force of the shaking and the heat radiating from Dan's body.  
His breathing was frighteningly fast and his body was completely limp against Phil's arms. Phil pressed the boy further into his own grasp and rocked him back and forth, mumbling soft "shhh"s into his hair.   
Dan felt like he had truly lost all control of everything in his body. The shaking was overwhelming and his breathing was way too fast. He was suffocating, he could feel it. When Phil pulled out the pills Dan's mind gasped a little, his body's breathing already too fast to speed up anymore. Why did Phil have those?  
Now, sitting in Phil's lap, he felt much safer. Though his body still didn't agree with him, he wasn't as panicked. He knew he was going to be okay.  
Phil rocked him back and forth as Dan focused on slowing his breathing. He glanced at the clock. They had been going at this for ten minutes now! They had to go live soon!  
Suddenly, someone knocked on the door. A muffled, man's voice called in, "Hello? Is anyone in here?"  
Dan's body jerked violently at the sudden shock. He squeezed his eyes shut and whimpered. He was scared.   
Phil held on tightly to the jerky boy. He was a lot stronger then he felt, even in the weak state he was in. Phil remembered how tired he both looked and was after the attack Dan had last August. This wasn't going to be much better. Phil continued to rock his best friend back and forth as he shouted back at the annoying man. Dan started shaking again.  
"Shhh… Shhhh… Dan it's okay! It's me, Phil." Phil cooed, trying to make Dan feel a little better. It was hard to hide his own anxiety about the situation in his voice, but he kept going. "Dan it's me, remember? It's Phil. I'm your best friend. We live together, we make youtube videos together! Think about that! Remember the flat, and how we sit together and watch the sunrise sometimes from the balcony. Think about your bed, how warm it is and soft and comfortable. Think about your friends. Think about all the times we go out to bars and clubs and just laugh and have a good time. Shhh Dan… shh.." He rubbed his hands up and down Dan's back, who was starting to calm down. Phil continued. "Shhh, think about me. Think about whenever we play video games and you always take the controller from me because i suck at it-" Dan's hands moved slowly up Phil's chest and clenched weakly around his shirt. Phil sucked in his breath, he was calming down! "-and think about how we always watch the same TV shows and we cuddle up sometimes when it's really cold or when you get too scared because of a film. It's okay, now Dan i know…" He sighed, "I know you're scared and nervous because of the radio show. I know you're terrified, i am too! But it's going to be okay. I'm going to help you okay! That's why we're doing this together, come on. You're going to do great! Everyone's going to love you. You're brilliant! You're so brilliant and wonderful and everyone is going to love you! _I love you…_ " He mumbled that last sentence. Dan was completely still.  
They sat frozen for a moment, Phil's hands still gently running up and down Dan's back. Dan shifted a little in Phil's lap, and Phil said a grateful prayer that Dan could move again.  
Dan shuffled around a bit more before turning his head up to look at Phil. He had to see him. Phil's glossy blue eyes were so much wider then normal. His gaze met Dan's and Dan whimpered. He looked so frightened. He was so worried about Dan. Dan's grip on Phil's T-shirt tightened and he leaned his head against the black-haired boy's shoulder. They sat there on the cold bathroom floor for a few more minutes before Phil gently began pushing Dan to stand up.  
With Phil's arms wrapped firmly around Dan's shoulders for support, the boys slowly made their way to the sink where Phil gently brushed a cold towel against Dan's forehead. The brown-haired boy's face wasn't as warm as it was before, but it was still a bit warm and sweaty. Dan stared at his shoes.   
When they had gotten Dan cleaned up, Phil glanced at the clock. Ten minutes 'till the show. They had to get going.  
Phil cupped his friends face in his hands and pulled his face up to his own. He stared right into the brown boy's eyes and took a deep breath, nodding. Dan followed suit, taking a deep breath, and whimpered as he leaned his head against Phil's hands.   
"I'm sorry." He spoke. Phil's heart shattered.  
"Don't." He managed to force out, nearly cutting Dan off. He stroked his thumb across Dan's face some more before dropping his hands and lacing his fingers between Dans. They walked out of the bathroom and made their way to the studio. The producer set them up in front of their microphones and went back to his side of the glass window in the studio. While all of the tech people were busy running around and pressing buttons, Dan felt Phil pull him into one final hug. For a moment, Dan buried his face into Phil's neck and wrapped his arms around his waist tightly. He felt Phil's lips against his ear whisper, "You're going to be so great." And he pulled away. The producer pointed at Dan and they put on their headphones just as the intro to their show finished playing. Dan spoke and they began.

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know the first thing about anxiety attacks okay don't talk to me
> 
> also this was supposed to be fluffy what happened


End file.
